The present invention contains microfiche Appendices I and II. Appendix I comprises four (4) microfiche having a total of 246 frames. Appendix II comprises one (1) microfiche having 90 frames. This invention relates to computer programs and particularly to operation of programs which utilize data from a data bank for computations in a computer system applications program. In particular the present invention provides a method for extracting data from a data bank for use in connection with a personal computer application program of the spread sheet type.
Spread sheet type programs are frequently used for purposes of analyzing the performances of companies and comparing the performances for making investment decisions. In operation of said spread sheet programs, it becomes necessary to supply data which represents the financial performance of various companies to the spread sheet program so that the program can execute computations which are designated by the spread sheet program operator.
In connection with the operation of other programs, for example programs which are arranged for the graphic display of certain parameters which may represent physical measurements from X-ray data or other test equipment, it is likewise necessary to supply data which is contained in a collection of data. Data from a data collection may also be required in graphics programs or word processing programs.
The assignee of the present invention markets a computer readable data bank, which contains a compilation of the financial performances of companies which are publicly traded. The data included in the data bank is organized under three principal data designating parameters, which include the name of the company whose performance is represented by the data, the type of data and the period for which the data corresponds. According to prior art operations, a person using a spread sheet computer program for purposes of comparing the performance of various publicly traded companies during periods of interest, and also using a data bank, such as that marketed by the assignee of the present invention, would be required to interrupt spread sheet program operation, obtain the required data from the data bank and manually enter the data into the spread sheet program in order to generate the comparative spread sheet which is of interest. Alternately, the operator may use programs for automatically entering data that require complex operations to designate the data and the location in the spread sheet in which data is to be inserted.
It is an object of the present invention to facilitate the transfer of data from a data bank, such as a financial or measurement data bank, into a utility program which is designed to make use of such data.